


Rituals and Reminders

by pipisafoat



Series: Remus's Sevens (part of the larger Harry Granger universe) [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Birthday, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Gryffindor Jack O'Neill, Head Boy Jack O'Neill, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Prefect Daniel Jackson, Ravenclaw Daniel Jackson, Room of Requirement, deathday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-18
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-09-25 08:57:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9812180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pipisafoat/pseuds/pipisafoat
Summary: He kneels on the floor of the room he creates every year for just this purpose.(stands alone but is part of a series/universe in which SG-1 characters are students at Hogwarts)





	

He kneels on the floor of the room he creates every year for just this purpose. The floor appears to be solid hard wood, stained dark with strong grain lines, but it’s soft on his knees. As he stares straight ahead, a portrait frame blossoms on the wall in front of his eyes, thick and with golden accents on a deep cherry wood. The mysterious room pauses in its development of Jack’s needs as it does each year as though waiting for him to steel himself for the image. He takes a deep breath and nods, and the frame fills with a still image of his brother.

Charlie is eight years old, just as he has been since Jack’s first time in this room in his first year. His blond hair lies neatly on his head, framing dancing blue eyes and a mischievous grin that Jack would do almost anything to see on the thirteen year old Charlie should be now. 

Jack thinks of the third years in Gryffindor - because there’s no doubt in his mind Charlie would have been sorted in his own House - and feels a strong moment of grief that Lee Jordan and the Weasley twins never got to meet his little brother. They would have gotten along very well, especially if Jack hadn’t had to learn the dangerous consequences of pranks long before becoming a prefect. He’s been told over and over that it was an accident and wasn’t his fault, but he knows he’s always going to hold the blame for it next to his heart. He's the one who left a box of magical fireworks sitting in his room when he came back to Hogwarts for his second year; he's the one who didn’t think about what a curious magical child like his brother could do with those without a wand or a way to channel his magic.

He spent most of his second year shouting at anyone who paid less than their full attention to any potentially harmful prank, panicking any time he found a firework unattended. Bill Weasley, then a prefect, found him one day hyperventilating in a dark corner of the Gryffindor common room, staring at a burnt out firework. Bill asked him what was going on, and the next thing Jack remembers is waking up in the infirmary with the fuzzy feeling too many Calming Draughts give a person. Apparently he’d started looking for Charlie, screaming that it wasn’t too late, they could save him if only they could _find_ him.

The day he was released from the Hospital Wing with a set of appointments with a mind healer, Bill found him, took him up into the part of the castle that had the Astronomy tower, and showed him the secret room in which he now kneels.

“Hi, little brother,” Jack whispers, and even though the portrait isn’t real and doesn’t move, he always imagines Charlie’s smile growing as he greets the older brother he so idolized. “It’s my seventh year now, and they went and made me Head Boy for some fool reason. I think Dumbledore just gives it to the Gryffindor every year for no good reason.

“Remember how I told you about Sara last year? Well, we broke up. She didn’t like that I do this every year. It’s over, but that’s okay. If she can’t leave me space for you in my life, she doesn’t get any space of her own.”

Jack shifts his weight slightly but doesn’t stand, doesn’t sit in the chair he knows the mysterious room has created behind him - it’s there every year, but he’s never used it. It won’t hurt him to kneel, and he owes Charlie at least that much.

“Harry Potter is here this year, except he’s been adopted by a Squib and her Muggle husband. He has a sister and everything. That wasn’t in any of the Harry Potter stories you loved, was it? Bit of a surprise to most people. I haven’t met him, but I do know his tutor - yeah, he and his sister get special tutoring because they want to keep learning the Muggle subjects. And because they don’t want to take History or Defense at Hogwarts. I can’t blame them. You know about Binns, of course, but the Defense teacher this year was a stuttering idiot. Daniel says when he taught Muggle Studies, he didn’t stutter at all, but his year away learning about Defense must not have been very good to him.”

He hesitates, then wonders why he’s even considering mincing words to a portrait. Even if Charlie were alive, he’d be a teenager and perfectly capable of understanding what’s going on in the world. Part of Jack’s crusade to keep people safe is to inform them of the risks they’re facing in their everyday life, and if he’s right….

“Rumor has it that Quirrell was possessed by You-Know-Who. A bunch of firsties saw the spirit come out of him when he was arrested. If he was possessed … if You-Know-Who is really around … Charlie, I don’t know what to tell you. I don’t know what to say. I’m still planning to try to get into the Aurors, and if You-Know-Who is coming back, they’ll need all the help they can get. I’m worried about my Defense score, though. Professor Lupin - right, that’s Harry Potter’s tutor; he’s filling in until they find a full-time Defense professor - Professor Lupin really seems to know what he’s doing. He didn’t teach us any spells this week, but Daniel taught us one, and really I think what he’s teaching us is actually more important than spells. Especially if I’m right about You-Know-Who. It’s all about how to survive an attack, how to work with what you already know. Professor Lupin has a good point, too, Charlie. It doesn’t matter how many spells I can cast if I don’t know when to cast them or how to use them best. Not to Aurors, at least, even if it does get me a higher NEWT score.

“He said next week we’re going to start working with different environments, talk about how you would react differently in a forest versus in a street versus alone with your attacker in a big empty space. He’s never said, but I think he’s worried about You-Know-Who, too. There are only seven of us in the class. Seven, out of twenty-seven in the whole year. I need to talk to Daniel about convincing him to start a Defense club so everyone can learn this stuff. Every year could do it, too, not just my class.

“Why talk to Daniel? Well, Charlie, I’m not really sure, but I get the feeling sometimes when Professor Lupin looks at me that he’s not really seeing me. He always seems really happy but then almost instantly looks … I don’t know. Angry. Sad. Maybe betrayed.” Jack breaks eye contact with the portrait and looks down at the floor. “I hope he’s not seeing me then, at least.”

He shakes himself and looks back up at his little brother and smiles. “I wish you were here. I think you would be better at understanding him than I am. All I know is that any time I think about looking him up, I can’t bring myself to do it. I trust him, Charlie-boy. I don’t know what’s going on in his head when he looks at me, but I trust him to teach us the best he can and to take care of us.

“Daniel gave me that smile today. You know the one. Like he knows something he has no way of knowing but still somehow does. The one he gave you just before Dad's and Father’s chairs collapsed at Yule dinner during my first year. Maybe it’s some secret Ravenclaw trick, and remind me again how I ended up best friends with a Ravenclaw? I think he knows that today is your day. I have a feeling he would have told me to say hi to you, but he knows me better than to mention you in the hallway.

“I’m sorry, kiddo. I don’t know what to tell you other than that I’ve learned something now. Even with Gryffindors being as rowdy as we can get, I’ve kept the Common Room as safe as I can ever since … you. Maybe that’s why Dumbledore made me Head Boy. I know it’s why McGonagall gave me prefect. You have a legacy at Hogwarts even without ever coming here. That’s something, isn’t it?”

Jack starts to stand but then hesitates. “Charlie-boy, this is my last year here. I don’t know what I’ll do this time next year. Just … don’t think I’ve forgotten you if I can’t do our ritual, okay?” He stands this time without pause and draws his wand from a pocket on his cloak. The room obligingly provides the usual table, long and skinny with a row of small candles neatly dividing it lengthwise, thirteen this year. Jack considers, as he does every year, shooting a single flame down the line to light them all, but he always decides it’s not personal enough and lights each candle one at a time with his full attention.

“Happy birthday, little brother. May my good wishes for your next year drown the sorrows of this also being your deathday.”

He turns on his heel and leaves the mysterious room without a backwards glance. As long as he never looks at the wall behind him, he can pretend he believes the door stays in place and the candles stay burning.


End file.
